Voice

What voice dictates your life? Where do you find the passion to speak? Is it out of anger, jealousy, sadness, hope, or none of the above? Take this observation from this evening. I was at the Apple store waiting for a friend to wrap up helping a customer when a man walked in. Greeted by the first employee, he said he wanteded to purchase a care plan for his iPad. He was directed off ahead to a fellow employee. I resumed passing time drooling over the slew of aluminum Macs in front of me. Starting to feel my nerves being rewired to force me to drop $1400 on something I really didn't need, I was thankfully saved by a fit of rage encroaching my right ear. I look up to see a group of Apple employees standing by the same man who was quite upset. For whatever reason, he was denied a care plan. He yelled, asking for corporate on the phone, saying he was mistreated and lied to. My first reaction? What an arrogant prick. How can he be upset that his $700 toy won't be covered from accidental damage when there are literally thousands each day eying from starvation, infectious diseases, and war? Then I had two immediate reactions. One, the obvious one that happens often, was realizing that I am in no place to judge. I have had my own White Whine moments. (One involving heavy drama over which MacBook I was to purchase. Pretty sure in the amount of time I stressed over that decision I could have built an entire school in Kenya). But I digress. The second reaction was this, his words come from some sort of emotion, as all of our words do. What if he was just an arrogant jerk? Or what if he had just bought this for his autistic son and was worried his boy might break it accidentally? What if he had just come from the courthouse, finishing up a settlement in a nasty divorce case? But beyond my reaction, it really got me thinking. Rather than focus on what I am saying, I need to ask myself from what emotion am I speaking these words? Because that is the root of it all. When I respond to a driver cutting me off, is it because I a, quick tempered or because there is an underlying frustration with being ignored and seen as second rate. If we truly want to change who we are, and how we react to situations, it is best not to see how we react to situations, but why. Is it out of jealousy or anger? Why did I flip that dumb Northern Virginia driver off? Why do I honk my horn when someone doesn't start off a green light fast enough? That is impatience, where is it coming from. We cannot free ourselves from our emotions until we have asked the tough questions. We cannot break away from emotions until we understand them. And when we finally understand the source if our emotions can we mature, level out, and start a life dictated by our decisions and not our fledgling hearts.